Hair Of The Dog
by Daisee Chain
Summary: Willow has a morning after a night before.


She thinks it might be lunchtime, but she's not sure. The curtains are still drawn. Joyce had bought good curtains, but they were still lightweight enough to let in the Californian morning sun. To counteract this, Willow habitually magics lead into them, making them heavy as metal shutters. Lead isn't strictly necessary, but there's so much of it in the gas flavored air of any American town, that it's easier than trying to pull up any of the other metals. It makes her grateful for the rampant consumerism she used to rail against, before she learnt that her mother's views were not her own.  
  
She sits, cross legged, at the top of her bed, waiting for the headache to subside. She knows there are painkillers in the drawer beside the bed, but she won't take them. This is her penance. Eventually all pleasure is paid for with pain, and this is her payback for last night.  
  
Last night, she went out with Amie. Last night, she overdid it again. She frowns remembering. Or rather, she frowns at what she does not remember. It had seemed so exciting, so exhilarating at the time. Now, she merely has vague recollections of dark things summoned, people screaming, herself and Amie laughing at the chaos. She supposes she ought to feel remorse for those innocent bystanders, but truly, she no longer cares. She's more concerned with the growing lapses in her recall. What if she starts leaking knowledge? What if the things she's spent years learning, start to run out her ears? Is that a side effect of magical blood loss? She swears to herself that today she will take a break. Today she will do no magic. Her strength is waning anyway, and she's beginning to look and feel as pale as Spike. Not that she had far to go.  
  
She reaches for the switch on the bedside light, but it's too far away. She can't stretch, her arm too tired even to lift this little distance. And it's trembling. She lets her hand drop to her side, watching in wonder as the trembling subsides. She recognizes this. The DT's, Xander's father used to call them. Back then she hadn't known the taste of acid metal in her mouth, that came with the shakes. She hadn't known the need to scrape the strange fur off her tongue, or to just lie all day doing nothing more strenuous than staring at the darkened ceiling, only venturing out once the sun had fallen. She hadn't known the joy of cool night breezes, the peace of the streets at 3am, the strange thrill of knowing she was one of a select few humans who saw the city that deep in the darkness. None of her sunny days were wasted when she used to play with Xander. She had studied, and taken extra math lessons, and worn the safe clothes her mother had bought her so that she would grow up to be a well balanced, independent minded young woman. Without being independent enough to be abnormal of course. She used to pity Mr. Harris back then. Used to think he was the victim of some chemical imbalance, or perhaps some deep psychological trauma. She's grown since then, in all meanings of the word. She understands that things that had seemed so simple are really as complicated as a chemistry experiment. All parts of the equation are delicately balanced. And that Mr. Harris probably actually just enjoyed being drunk more than he enjoyed being sober.  
  
She frowns again into the darkness and thinks of turning on the light without touching it. Sudden blinding brilliance forces her to throw her arm up to shield her eyes. As the orange glow behind her eyelids finally fades, she uncovers her face, and sits blinking, slowly, like a lizard. She hadn't meant to do that. She knows she probably said the words, but she can't remember doing it. More and more she finds herself staring at the handiwork of her spells, trying to remember when exactly she decided she was going to use magic for cleaning the house, or getting back home, or writing her essays, or convincing Buffy that Dawn will be perfectly safe on her own in the house at night. She knows she's no longer totally in control, but even so it's hard to see why that should be a problem. A vaguely defined sense of unease is not reason enough to stop doing something. If it was, everyone would just quit work and not go back in, and then where would the world be?  
  
If she were still the old Will's, the nice Willow she spent so many years trying to be, she would just tell herself to buck right up and enjoy the many advantages life has sent her. She is not a starving Aids orphan in Africa. She is not a wailing widow in India. She is not nice Willow. She no longer cares for that Willow. That Willow got used and trampled. This Willow's time has finally come. And she will not apologize for being an adult, with all the attendant problems that implies.  
  
Being an adult means making difficult decisions, dealing with loss, and falling in and out of love, and she has much experience with these things already. She has chosen to take part in a difficult fight against darkness that could swallow ordinary people and spit out their bones before their family knew they were gone. Well, not so much chosen, she supposes, as fallen into, and not attempted to leave. She deals with loss on a regular basis. Really, it's a wonder that all of them aren't already insane from the number of deaths and departures they've been through. Yes, well. The departures. Three loves in her life gone. All with perfectly good reasons for going. All perfectly sensible, rational reasons. Carefully crafted stories of needing time apart, to think, to do some alone time. Xander of course had the best excuse; he had never really loved her to begin with. But Oz and Tara, while professing love and wearing faces of anguish, had managed with a few well chosen words to mutilate her insides, make her wish that she had never been so foolish as to trust them. Both said they were doing this for her own good. But Willow knows. This Willow knows the dark secret that none of them would utter out loud. They left, all of them, because this Willow is not worth their time and attention. This Willow is the one behind the facade of nice Willow. Nice Willow was who they fell in love with, this Willow, the one they found under the painstakingly applied concern for others and need to help. This Willow will spend her life alone because she is not someone who can stay in the background. She is not ordinary, nor nice. She is who she always was, only now without the mask.  
  
Carefully, as if her head might fall off, as it feels it might, she shuffles to the edge of the bed, swings her legs down and stands. When after a minute she still hasn't fainted, and the pulsing in her brain has subsided along with the urge to vomit, she paces to the mirror, gingerly sits on the stool, and sits facing her reflection. What stares back at her isn't a face she can remember seeing before. It looks much older than she ever recalls being; the lines and dark circles adding to the impression of a life lived too hard. Even her most denial led friends might question her if she shows up looking like this. Make up is definitely required today.  
  
"Prettificus." The word is out of her mouth before she even finishes thinking it. An exquisitely made over Willow stares back at her from the glass. One without the bloodshot, gritty eyes. Less than half an hour after resolving to do no magic today, and she's already two spells down. Well, no sense in beating herself up about it. Done is done. And if she's lapsed twice already, could one more little one really hurt? The flannel nightgown she wears, dissolves and is replaced by jeans and a green t-shirt she's sure she never actually bought. The giddy feeling that accompanies the rush of power in use, surges through her, ramping up her energy, dissipating the headache, making her wonder why she didn't just do this earlier. And really, now that she thinks about it, it makes no sense to flail herself with the whip of self-sacrifice. This is the gift she was given, an ability few others have. To deny this is to deny her true self. This is who she is. This is what she is meant to be and do. This is Willow now. And as this Willow leaves the room, the light goes off as if by itself, and the curtains lighten strangely, then open to reveal the searing midday sun. 


End file.
